Neuroscience
- Master of Science in Neuroscience
- Doctor of Philosophy
Facilities for Graduate Work
The Institute for Neuroscience offers excellent opportunities for multidisciplinary graduate study in the neurosciences. Facilities include those maintained by the participating programs in the Colleges of Natural Sciences, Liberal Arts, Pharmacy, Engineering, Education, and Communication. Institutional support, training grants, and federal and state grants to investigators in the institute provide stipends and support research. Faculty members throughout the institute participate in interdisciplinary seminars and a year-long, broadly based neuroscience course. The goal of the institute is to train students to employ multidisciplinary approaches in their careers in neuroscience research and teaching. Toward this end, the faculty seeks to provide a diverse, cohesive, and interactive atmosphere and a flexible curriculum that meets the needs of each individual.
Areas of Study
Neuroscience encompasses behavioral, systems, cellular, molecular, and computational approaches to understanding the nervous system. The faculty use a wide variety of state-of-the-art techniques for their studies, including functional magnetic and optical imaging, various behavioral analyses of animals and humans, transmission and scanning electron microscopy, molecular and cellular biophysics, cellular- and systems-level neurophysiology, biochemistry, molecular genetics, and various types of computer modeling. The research-intensive environment emphasizes multidisciplinary investigations. The program offers students both a sound education in neuroscience and a broad experience in other disciplines.
Graduate Studies Committee
The following faculty members served on the Graduate Studies Committee in the spring semester 2006–2007.
- Creed W. Abell
- Lawrence D. Abraham
- Seema Agarwala
- Richard W. Aldrich
- Nigel S. Atkinson
- Chandrajit L. Bajaj
- Dana H. Ballard
- Adela Ben-Yakar
- Susan Bergeson
- George D. Bittner
- Craig A. Champlin
- Lawrence K. Cormack
- David P. Crews
- Yvon Delville
- Michael P. Domjan
- Sharon Dormire
- Andrew K. Dunn
- Christine Duvauchelle
- Roger P. Farrar
- Benito Fernández
- Wilson S. Geisler III
- Nace L. Golding
- Rueben A. Gonzales
- Francisco Gonzalez-Lima
- Andrea Gore
- Lisa Griffin
- Jeffrey M. Gross
- Kristen M. Harris
- Adron Harris
- Mary M. Hayhoe
- Johann Hofmann
- Alexander C. Huk
- Jody Jensen
- Daniel Johnston
- Theresa Jones
- Robert A. Josephs
- Swathi Kiran
- Helmut J. Koester
- Michelle A. Lane
- W. Todd Maddox
- Michael Mauk
- Dennis McFadden
- John Mihic
- Risto Miikkulainen
- Hitoshi Morikawa
- Richard A. Morrisett
- Martin Poenie
- George D. Pollak
- Mendell Rimer
- Michael J. Ryan
- Timothy Schallert
- Christine E. Schmidt
- David M. Schnyer
- Eyal Seidemann
- Jason B. Shear
- Harel Shouval
- D. Max Snodderly
- Harvey M. Sussman
- Wesley J. Thompson
- John B. Wallingford
- Richard E. Wilcox
- Baxter F. Womack
- Harold H. Zakon
- Bing Zhang
Admission Requirements
The requirements of the Graduate School for admission into a Doctor of Philosophy degree program must be met. However, the qualifications of most admitted applicants exceed these minimum requirements. All applicants must hold a bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university, usually in a biological science, chemistry, computer sciences, experimental psychology, pharmacy, or engineering. Undergraduate preparation should include one year of chemistry, one year of biology, mathematics through calculus, physics, one semester of cell biology, and one semester of experimental psychology. However, students without some of these prerequisites may be admitted on the condition that they make up any deficiencies during their first two years of study.
Degree Requirements
Master of Science in Neuroscience. Students are not admitted to this program, but under certain circumstances, some students may be granted the master’s degree if they are unable to complete the requirements for the doctoral degree. These students must complete thirty semester hours of coursework and must submit a thesis based on individual research. The thirty hours must include the core courses in neuroscience: Neuroscience 382T, 383T, 185, 186, a statistics course, and an ethics course.
Doctor of Philosophy. At least eighty-one semester hours of coursework are required, including Neuroscience 382T, 383T, 185, 186, a statistics course, and an ethics course. One goal of this requirement is to help the student prepare for the qualifying examinations, taken in the spring of the second year.
Dual Degree Program
Doctor of Philosophy/Doctor of Medicine
The graduate program in neuroscience participates in a dual degree program with the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (UTMB). Applicants must apply separately to and be admitted to both the PhD program in neuroscience at the University of Texas at Austin and the medical school at UTMB. Students accepted into the dual degree program spend their first two years in the medical school at UTMB, followed by three to four years of doctoral work at UT Austin and eighteen months of clinical rotations. The degrees are conferred separately by each institution.
For More Information
Campus address: Neural Molecular Science Building (NMS) 4.104B, phone (512) 471-3640, fax (512) 471-0390; campus mail code: C7000
Mailing address: The University of Texas at Austin, Institute for Neuroscience, 1 University Station C7000, Austin, TX 78712
E-mail: neuroscience@clm.utexas.edu